Chapter 9: How Dragons Are Seen

“Is there anything else I can get you?” Ciara asked. 

Kashira hummed, “I suppose it would be nice if you knew a place to eat that would accommodate someone like me?”

Ciara looked thoughtful. “Well, it might be handy for you at some point to consider something to change your size or your form—since you seem to be a dragon that doesn’t?”

Kashira’s gut tightened as she wondered if she had been looked up on a Seeing Slate. “Do you have anything like that here?”

“No, not presently, but I can watch for something if you would like? Or, if you are patient, perhaps one day I can make you something?”

Kashira considered it. “I think so, yes; if you could, that would be nice. We will visit again sometime.” I think this town is unavoidable for a little while because I am not really familiar with anywhere else.

The kitsune beamed and nodded. “So, I think the tavern most likely to be interested in feeding you will be the Gentle Willow Bar. So here is the town center...” She started to draw in the air with floating blue lines of fire. “... and here we are at the Exotic Exchange. Up here, by the west gate, the Gentle Willow Bar.” She drew a dramatic line for the wall and a heart for where the bar was in relation to it.

At this moment, there was the sound of someone shrieking, a high-pitched feminine voice, “Let me go! Please! Let go!”

Ciara’s ears went toward the front of the building, which Goren couldn’t see from here. Then, she smiled up at Kashira. “Does that help? Will there be anything else?”

“No, thank you. I look forward to doing business again in the future,” Kashira said neutrally.

“Of course! Have a lovely night,” she said, retreating into the warmth of the Exchange, glancing back over her shoulder once. Neither she, nor the dragon did anything to react to the sound of someone screaming.

“No! I don’t want to go, stop!” But after another moment, it grew quiet.

Goren looked up at her. “What... was that?”

Kashira said, “I assume someone being brought in for a collar, like yours.” She waited, watching, and Goren felt himself chilled through and through.

“I... how does it even work?”

“You demonstrate that you are stronger than the other person and could control them, or they voluntarily come with you.” She leaned down and touched her nose to him. “So,” Kashira changed the subject, “do you want to try riding as long as I don’t fly?”

Goren was unsettled by how unemotional she was about it. Then, he looked at the building with its enchantments and all the wood carvings on each door and how beautified it had been. It surely had stood a long time. It was, perhaps, the way of things here. He decided to let it go as he looked up at her shoulders. “You promise it’s only while you walk?”

Kashira chuckled, and she nuzzled him. “I am sure it was quite frightening. We will figure out something different next time.” 

She offered him her other paw to lift him up to her shoulders. He climbed into it. She felt a small, fluttery sensation in her chest. I suppose it is really nice to see him moving around almost casually around my claws. It is a long way off from kicking at me as hard as he could before. She smiled as she lifted him up to her shoulders and felt him pull a little against her mane to get settled on. “All good?”

“Yes, but maybe walk slowly.”

“Sure,” she said. She moved slowly as she felt him sit up. 

“This is not so bad when there is not intense wind and your mane whipping at me,” he said after a few steps of her heading toward the tavern. 

“I am glad to hear that. I suppose I did not think about my mane in the wind. I am sorry about that.”

“It’s fine,” he huffed. “So you found a random jayune in a snowstorm, and now you are in Arieton… Doesn’t any of this seem… I dunno, over the top?” 

She smiled. “Are you worried you will owe me something?”

He fidgeted; his wings moved against his back. “I guess, maybe, yes?”

She smiled and decided to turn it around on him. “I just made you my property; are you sure it isn’t the other way around? I took all of you, and you think somehow you should still owe me after?”

There was a long pause, and then she smiled as she got the most satisfying, flustered, drawn-out huff out of him. “I guess that is true. But… I dunno. If you were lonely or whatever motivated you, why did you stay so far away from everyone?” 

“It is just difficult to be my size and converse with most people comfortably. It took you quite a while to warm up to me.”

“Yes, well, you grabbed me out of a snowstorm with your mouth; I believe this is an intense way of meeting someone.” 

She grinned. “That may be true.” She made her way through the streets, watching people sidle away from them because she was a dragon. “But, also, you were soaking wet and about the same temperature as a snowflake.”

“You’re exaggerating,” he said with a slight pout as he fidgeted with her mane, detangling part of it with his fingers. It left her with a pleasant tingling sensation near that spot. “But you didn’t answer my question. You… I don’t know, it’s been a day? But you feel so… warm and affectionate. Interested in me, and it feels… out of place, I guess.” 

Kashira smiled. This again. She supposed that she could certainly empathize with it. She didn’t have any fear that he could do anything truly hurtful to her. She supposed perhaps it was possible that as they got to know each other better, he could get into a fight, and he could eventually say something that could hurt her feelings. But, as far as anything else? She just didn’t have the same cause as he did to worry. So, how to answer this worry in a way that I can make him understand? 

“Well, all right. So, look around, how do you see people reacting to me?” she asked.  

Goren looked around as she asked him to do so. He saw someone ahead of them dart into a house and close the door as quickly as they could without slamming it. That reaction made the most sense to him. The next most common reaction was people pressing out of her way. He also noticed that some stared at the blue dragon or at him, perched up on her shoulders the way he was. None of them looked like they particularly wanted her attention. “I guess they are scared of you, right? But I was scared of you. My heart was racing so fast I thought I would faint.”

“True, you froze up like a cute little statue,” she agreed, teasing him. 

He huffed. Everything is an opportunity for her to tease me. 

“There are two other common reactions. One of them is to get into a large group and try to scare off or hurt the dragon. It’s not my favorite. Sometimes there is magic involved that makes the situation difficult for me to get out of without causing damage. Or, sometimes, there is a weird fixation on me, and things get uncomfortable because of the expectations there are on how the interaction will go in their heads.” 

“So, you are telling me you find people difficult to interact with, so…” He shook his head, not at all sure how that answered anything. “So, you found pulling me out of a snowstorm an easier interaction than trying to say hello to people in a town like this one? Or… what?” 

She chuckled. “For an artist, you are a terribly pragmatic little bunbun.” This time, he feels her huff beneath him, and it brings color to his cheeks. “Yes, of course, you were an opportunity to interact with someone in a way that felt easy to me, but it wasn’t just that. You were cold and frightened and in desperate need of help. So, I helped you.”

He was quiet for a time, running his fingers through her hair as a few snowflakes drifted down. “But, you’re a dragon; you can eat things like me pretty easily. I mean… kinda, you did.” 

“Yes, I know you are going to worry about that for a long time, and you might wonder every time I put my mouth near you if today is the day I eat you for real? Yes?” 

Goren huffed. He hadn’t meant to be that obvious about it. He slumped forward and hid his face in her soft, silvery white mane. “I mean… a little, but less now than I did, also.” 

She chuckled again. “You don’t need to worry. I don’t make it a practice to kill things that talk back to me. Besides, you are clearly underestimating how adorable I find you.” 

“Yeah, right,” he said, feeling his face flush, having an almost harder time accepting that. 

She thrums. “You’re a little moody, but genuine. And I think with everything that you have been through for the last few days? You have every right to be more than just moody.” 

He closed his eyes as the image of smoke curling off the homes of Buetarn came back to him. The gnoll calling to him. He gulped until the tight feeling behind his eyes went away. “Don’t say things like that,” he puffed, whiskers wrinkling a little.

Kashira smiled as he hid his face in her mane and got all clingy with her. So very cute. She breathed out slowly. I imagine that some of your stoicism is not thinking about it too much. If I really do take you back to Buetarn in the morning, it will be an interesting experience… and I might very well be signing myself up for days of trying to cheer up an extremely sad little bunny boy. 

She didn’t know when the gnolls had come. She didn’t know if there was reason to expect that there were any jayunes left. But just because they were hungry didn’t mean that they were all ruthless. And so, just because she hadn’t seen any loose non-gnolls wandering about, it didn’t mean that there was no one left at all. It seemed like a good idea to her to at least find out if someone was left for Goren. Otherwise, it might be a loose end that haunted him forever. Sometimes more pain working through it now saves you a lifetime of evading it and being haunted by guilt and regret.

I just hope we’re actually lucky and things are better than they seem.